Wired's last bastion falls to Lycos

The last tribunes of the electronic frontier have gone corporate

Lycos has bought Wired Digital, what was left of Wired's pioneering attempt to carve a slice for itself out of the electronic frontier, for $83 million worth of stock. The operation was originally an offshoot of the formerly seminal Wired magazine, which was itself sold to 'straight' publishers Conde Nast for $75 million earlier this year. Tragically for Wired and its founders, the herald of the revolution seems to have got itself consolidated without making the stratospheric sums recently associated with Web-related operations. Parent company Wired Ventures twice failed in its attempts to go public. The deal with Lycos is basically about increasing the latter's volumes. Lycos claims to reach more than 40 per cent of Web users, and Wired's addition ought to increase its reach, and beef up its content. Lycos says the Wired Digital brands will remain distinct, but will become part of the Lycos Network. ® Click for more stories